Tesla Shorts Have Lost Nearly $500 Million This Week

Despite a late-day selloff on Wednesday, it’s been a tough week for Tesla Inc TSLA shorts. After the company reported earlier this week that its first-quarter vehicle deliveries were in line with expectations, Tesla stock surged to new all-time highs above $292.

Short End Of The Stock

According to S3 Partners analyst Ihor Dusaniwsky, traders on the short end of the polarizing stock suffered tremendous losses.

“Today’s announcement, coupled with Chinese internet behemoth Tencent Holdings’ recent purchase of a 5 percent stake in Tesla for $1.8 billion and the start of solar tile sales in April, paints a much rosier picture of Tesla’s revenue growth,” Dusaniwsky wrote after the delivery data was released.

S3 Partners reports Tesla’s short interest has been steadily on the rise since October 2016. With the stock now up 39.2 percent year-to-date, short sellers have endured a net loss of more than $2.7 billion in 2017.

Roughly $500 million of those losses have come this week alone. Tesla CEO Elon Musk added insult to injury on Monday by tweeting “Stormy weather in Shortville…”

Stormy weather in Shortville ...

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 3, 2017
 

As of Monday, there was a net Tesla short interest of more than $8.9 billion. The borrow fee for Tesla shares was at 1.7 percent, its lowest level in recent history. According to shortsqueeze.com, Tesla’s current short percent of float stands at 24.4 percent.

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